Re: Part 2: System Structure

[Marcus Brinkmann]

At Fri, 19 May 2006 12:04:32 -0400,
"Jonathan S. Shapiro" <address@hidden> wrote:
> 
> On Fri, 2006-05-19 at 13:50 +0200, Marcus Brinkmann wrote:
> > At Tue, 16 May 2006 10:16:47 -0400,
> > "Jonathan S. Shapiro" <address@hidden> wrote:
> > > I am very very concerned about the extremist ideology of transparency
> > > here. This goes ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE beyond what is required by GPL or
> > > FSF. GPL does not say "if you run my program, you must disclose all of
> > > your data". It does not even say "if you modify my program, you must
> > > give away the modifications".
> > 
> > These are all caricatures of things that have been said.  Nobody said
> > anything like that, so there is no need to comment.
> 
> These are not intended to be caricatures. They are an honest attempt to have
> a discussion in order to clearly understand how your position extends the
> position of GPL. If we are going to go further than GPL, I want to
> understand how. It is very disturbing to me that you are unwilling to
> openly discuss this.

You seem to be confused about my intentions.  I do not mix up my
personal ethics with technical policy decisions.  I have proposed my
system structure because it is sufficient in achieving all technical
goals that I think we have, and because it is minimal in that regard.
In this sense I think it is a good design.  If you think that further
goals need to be included (and/or some existing ones should be
dropped), then such action would require justification.

This has absolutely nothing to do with licenses.  However, there is a
separate discussion about what are the intentions and goals of the
FSF.  Because my design does NOT include a "transparency proposal",
there is no need to discuss if such a proposal would be appropriate
for the FSF.

You are disturbed about my perceived unwillingness to openly discuss
something, but my "unwillingness" to discuss this issue has a reason:
You are trying to discuss a proposal that nobody is making.  You keep
insisting that there is some sort of "transparency proposal" on the
table, but there is not.  I have said so, repeatedly, and in no terms
that could be mistaken.  You can find it in my response to your "co-ed
naked" joke.  You can find it in the addendum to Part 1, "Ownership
and Contracts", in the section "Quantitative Differences Cause
Qualitative Differences".  And you can find it in Part 2, "System
Structure", in the section "Suspicious Collaboration", plus in several
other emails as well.

The discussion about my personal ethics has in this case completely
overshadowed the technical discussion of what is actually achieved in
my system structure, and what can be achieved by extensions.  I can
understand that in the beginning there has been some confusion.
However, at the very least since I made a rather complete description
in two parts, this particular confusion should have been eliminated.
Please take a careful look at how you are making your argument:
Everytime you come up with this "transparency proposal" thingie, you
never actually quote me.  You do not even use my language.  In fact,
you do not refer at all to anything I said.  This is a strong
indication that you are not talking about my proposals, but about
something that only exists in your perception.

Both system structures, the one I proposed, and the EROS/Coyotos
model, bear some evidence of our personal ethics.  However, one should
not confuse one with the other.

From my perspective, it is me who is making the conservative proposal,
and you who is trying to introduce radical changes.  Thus, the burden
of proof is on you.  I can understand that for you, with your
background, it is the other way round.  However, we are discussing the
Hurd, and not the Coyotos operating system.  We are not operating in a
vacuum, but based on the existing Hurd system (with all its flaws),
and the free software movement.  That's our starting point.

[...]

> First let me explain what I meant by "it is all voluntary": the user can
> front-end an opaque bank with a wrapper that records allocations. The
> program can refuse to run from such a wrapped bank. Choice is preserved
> on both sides.
> 
> I do not believe that the design you propose preserves choice in this
> sense. If I am mistaken, I would be interested to hear a description of
> how these choices on both sides are recovered in your design.

From the above references, the most elaborate are the ones in the
addendum to Part 1, and the final section in Part 2.

Note, however, that I believe that the GPL v3 may impose further,
non-technical restrictions.

> > > I believe that this proposal fundamentally violates the privacy
> > > protections that are built into the GPL, and I question whether it is
> > > appropriate for an FSF-hosted project to do that.
> > 
> > Jonathan, I am in contact with Richard on these issues since last
> > autumn.  I have probably exchanged a hundred emails with him on this
> > subject matter.
> 
> I am aware that you have discussed DRM with Richard. Have you discussed
> this transparency proposal specifically? Richard is very good at
> thinking these things through. He may see implications that we do not. I
> do not propose to preempt you. I do suggest that we have an individual
> available who is very good at this sort of analysis, and it seems
> foolish not to ask.

I have not discussed any "transparency proposal" because such a
proposal does not exist.  I have summarized Part 1 "Ownership and
Contracts" to him, and he agreed with the summary, with one
reservation: He did not agree with an assumption by Hegel that the
whole world can be described using a framework of ownership.  As such
an assumption is not necessary for my argument, this reservation does
not diminish it.

I have discussed system structure with Richard before, and when I
described the constructor mechanism to him, he immediately rejected it
without further consideration as soon as he figured out (without me
telling him) that it could be used to support DRM.  To solve some of
the problems I described, he suggested himself a recursive system
structure, at a time where I was not ready to believe that such a
structure would be sufficient.  This was in last autumn, just at the
time where we agreed on the research agenda, so I told Richard that I
was not prepared to give up the constructor design pattern without
carefully researching it.  At that time, I was fully aware that I
probably had to leave the GNU project if my research would indicate
that the constructor was necessary (and was prepared to do so).

This is one reason why I am very grateful to you: By getting to
understand your point of view, I was able to make a choice on my own.
I would not have had this choice if I had only seen the FSF's point of
view on the issue.  I got to see intimately both sides, and could make
my own decisions, based on my own evaluation.  This is something
extremely valuable, and I appreciate it very, very much, and it would
have been impossible without your support.

> > The sentence "No permission is given for modes of distribution that
> > deny users that run covered works the full exercise of the legal
> > rights granted by this License" is pretty clear.
> 
> Actually, I think this particular sentence is free of content. A license
> cannot grant rights that are not permitted under law, and the mode of
> distribution of software does not relate to the execution-time behavior
> of that software.

I do not understand your objection.
 
> The portion that is clearer (in my mind) on this subject comes later:
> 
> >  No covered work constitutes part of an effective technological
> >  protection measure: that is to say, distribution of a covered work as
> >  part of a system to generate or access certain data constitutes
> >  general permission at least for development, distribution and use,
> >  under this License, of other software capable of accessing the same
> >  data."  http://gplv3.fsf.org/
> 
> Even this, however, doesn't disable DRM. One of the beauties and challenges
> of DRM is that I can completely open source the protecting program, and
> I can allow you to replicate it to any degree you wish, and I can allow
> you to use your replicate to attempt to access the content. The TPM
> mechanism will protect the content owner.
>
> Note: I am not taking a position here on whether this is good. I am
> trying to state an opinion that the wording, as written, may not achieve
> the intended goal.
> 
> > The second paragraph has a slightly different twist to it.  It
> > specifically forbids to use covered works for things like locked-down
> > gaming consoles or other proprietary devices, which do not allow
> > changes be made by the owner.
> 
> That is certainly the intention of the text. I'm just not sure they got
> it right.

I agree that the wording may not achieve the goal.  It is a draft
document after all.  However, we were not discussing legalese, but
intent.  And the intent is clearly described by the rationale document
that extends the GPL v3 draft, or by what Richard said about this in
interviews etc.  So, maybe I should have quoted from those interviews,
rather than the GPL v3 draft.  But as you agree about the intention, I
don't think that it is necessary.

Thanks,
Marcus